Bribriesco-Ledger v. Klipsch

• Decision Date: 09 April 2021
• Docket Number: No. 19-1397,19-1397
• Citation: 957 N.W.2d 646
• Parties: Nicole BRIBRIESCO-LEDGER, Appellee, v. Frank J. KLIPSCH, Mayor, and the City of Davenport, Iowa, Appellants.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

957 N.W.2d 646

Nicole BRIBRIESCO-LEDGER, Appellee,

v.Frank J. KLIPSCH, Mayor, and the City of Davenport, Iowa, Appellants.

No. 19-1397

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Submitted December 15, 2020

Filed April 9, 2021

Richard A. Davidson and Brett R. Marshall (argued) of Lane & Waterman LLP, Davenport, for appellants.

Michael J. Meloy (argued), Bettendorf, for appellee.

McDermott, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which Christensen, C.J., and Mansfield, McDonald, and Oxley, JJ., joined. Appel, J., filed a dissenting opinion. Waterman, J., took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.

McDERMOTT, Justice.

This appeal requires us to answer whether Davenport's mayor may remove an appointee from the Davenport Civil Rights Commission without cause. Mayor Frank Klipsch issued an order removing Commissioner Nicole Bribriesco-Ledger from the commission before her term had expired. Bribriesco-Ledger sued, claiming that without a showing of cause the mayor had no authority to remove her. Klipsch and the City of Davenport filed a motion for summary judgment contending that the law imposed no obligation to show cause for the removal. The district court denied the motion, and Klipsch and the City filed an application for interlocutory review, which we granted.

The Iowa Civil Rights Act imposes certain requirements on cities. At issue in this case is Iowa Code section 216.19(2) (2019), which provides:

A city with a population of twenty-nine thousand, or greater, shall maintain an independent local civil rights agency or commission consistent with commission rules adopted pursuant to chapter 17A. An agency or commission for which a staff is provided shall have control over such staff. A city required to maintain a local civil rights agency or commission shall structure and adequately fund the agency or commission in order to effect cooperative undertakings with the Iowa civil rights commission and to aid in effectuating the purposes of this chapter.

Davenport's population exceeds the statute's threshold and, in compliance with the associated requirement, the City of Davenport maintains the Davenport Civil Rights Commission. The Davenport Municipal Code requires the mayor to appoint the members of the commission with confirmation by the city council. See Davenport, Iowa Municipal Code § 2.58.040 (2019). The term of appointment is two years unless the appointment fills a vacancy for an unexpired term. Id.

Klipsch appointed Bribriesco-Ledger to fill a regular two-year term on the Davenport Civil Rights Commission to begin December 1, 2017. But on April 15, 2019 (and thus before the term expired), Klipsch sent a letter to Bribriesco-Ledger and three other commissioners removing each of them from the commission "[e]ffective immediately." The letter included several pages stating "the reasons" for the action. Four new commissioners were appointed on April 24. Bribriesco-Ledger contested the removal, filing a petition for writ of certiorari and declaratory judgment, and seeking a money judgment for attorney fees and costs, against Klipsch and the City.

Neither the Iowa Civil Rights Act nor the Davenport Municipal Code addresses removal procedures for appointees to the commission. But procedures for "removal of appointees" from city offices are set forth in Iowa Code section 372.15, which states:

Except as otherwise provided by state or city law, all persons appointed to city office may be removed by the officer or body making the appointment, but every such removal shall be by written order. The order shall give the reasons, be filed in the office of the city clerk, and a copy shall be sent by certified mail to the person removed who, upon request filed with the clerk within thirty days of the date of mailing the copy, shall be granted a public hearing before the council on all issues connected with the removal. The hearing shall be held within thirty days of the date the request is filed, unless the person removed requests a later date.

Removal from office under section 372.15 doesn't require that the removal be for cause. Waddell v. Brooke , 684 N.W.2d 185, 190 (Iowa 2004) ; Bennett v. City of Redfield , 446 N.W.2d 467, 473 (Iowa 1989) ; Scott v. City of Waterloo , 190 Iowa 467, 469, 180 N.W. 156, 157 (1920) (holding that an earlier iteration of the statute "does not require, as a condition precedent, the removal by the mayor of one appointed by him to office that he charge and prove misbehavior").

In its summary judgment ruling, the district court held that section 216.19(2) preempts (as an exception "otherwise provided by state or city law") the broad removal power granted in section 372.15. Keying in on the word independent in the phrase "independent local civil rights agency or commission," the district court applied a definition for independent from Black's Law Dictionary meaning "[n]ot subject to the control or influence of another." (Alteration in original.) The district court also cited the Black's Law Dictionary definition for independent agency as "[a] federal agency, commission, or board that is not under the direction of the executive, such as the Federal Trade Commission or the National Labor Relations Board."

The district court cited several federal cases in finding that dismissal for cause is a fundamental feature of an independent agency. Finding nothing in the Iowa Civil Rights Act suggesting that our legislature intended to deviate from this feature of agency independence, the district court held that the phrase "independent local civil rights agency or commission" required a showing of cause to remove Bribriesco-Ledger and denied the motion.

In this interlocutory appeal, we review to determine whether the district court made an error of law in its ruling. Iowa R. App. P. 6.907 ; Nelson v. Lindaman , 867 N.W.2d 1, 6 (Iowa 2015). No party has raised mootness as a ground to prevent our consideration of this appeal but, as always, "an appellate court has responsibility sua sponte to police its own jurisdiction." Crowell v. State Pub. Def. , 845 N.W.2d 676, 681 (Iowa 2014). Bribriesco-Ledger's two-year term would have expired in November 2019, arguably making a ruling in her favor now without force or effect. See Homan v. Branstad , 864 N.W.2d 321, 328 (Iowa 2015) ; see also Young v. Olsen , 115 N.W. 1020, 1020 (Iowa 1908) (per curiam) (unpublished table decision) (appeal mooted in opponent's election challenge when the term of office in controversy expired). But we choose to decide this case on the merits under the "public-importance" exception to our mootness rule. Homan , 864 N.W.2d at 330 (describing the factors we consider to determine whether we should exercise our discretion to decide a moot action). We believe this is an issue of sufficient public import, and because the length of time remaining on a removed commissioner's term might often be relatively short, this case presents in particular a situation likely to "recur yet evade appellate review," warranting exercise of the exception to our general rule against deciding moot cases. Maghee v. State , 773 N.W.2d 228, 234 (Iowa 2009) (quoting State v. Hernandez-Lopez , 639 N.W.2d 226, 234 (Iowa 2002) ).

We haven't previously interpreted the meaning of the phrase "independent local civil rights agency or commission" in section 216.19(2). Consistent with the district court's ruling, Bribriesco-Ledger argues that the word "independent," as a descriptor of agency or commission , connotes a legal term of art in public law that refers to an agency or commission whose core feature is that executive officials may not remove its heads from office except for cause. See Adrian Vermeule, Conventions of Agency Independence , 113 Colum. L. Rev. 1163, 1168–69 (2013). She cites, for example, to Humphrey's Executor v. United States , in which the Federal Trade Commission was described as independent because its enacting statute, 15 U.S.C. § 41, permitted removal of Federal Trade Commissioners only for "inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office." 295 U.S. 602, 619, 629, 55 S. Ct. 869, 870, 874, 79 L.Ed. 1611 (1935) (quoting 15 U.S.C. § 41 ). This type of "cause" requirement, Bribriesco-Ledger argues, demonstrates that the legislature intended the adjective "independent" in section 216.19(2) to require removal of local civil rights commissioners only for cause.

But Bribriesco-Ledger's argument requires us to work backward, flipping the premise and conclusion. We're not asked to describe an agency as independent because its leaders may be removed only for cause; we're asked to find that an agency's leaders may be removed only for cause because the agency is described as independent. Reduced to a logical statement, we have "If A, then B." Bribriesco-Ledger asks us to interpret the statute with its converse: "If B, then A."

But her proposed reading fails through an even simpler analysis: the straightforward textual interpretation of the statute. In interpreting a law, the words of the text are of paramount importance. Doe v. State , 943 N.W.2d 608, 610 (Iowa 2020) ; Antonin Scalia & Bryan A. Garner, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts 33 (2012) [hereinafter Scalia & Garner, Reading Law ]. Words bear their ordinary meanings unless the context indicates that a technical meaning applies. Seavert v. Cooper , 187 Iowa 1109, 1113, 175 N.W. 19, 21 (1919) ; Scalia & Garner, Reading Law , at 73. Bribriesco-Ledger concedes that in no other place in the Iowa Code has the legislature loaded the word "independent" to mean "permitting removal from office only for cause." On the contrary, when the legislature wishes to require removal of commissioners from office only for cause, it explicitly says so. See, e.g. , Iowa Code § 13B.8 (local public defender and others removable "for cause" by state public defender); id. § 341A.12 (classified civil service employees subject to removal "for cause" by the county sheriff); id. § 414.8 (local board of adjustment members removable ...